


Under the Dancing Northern Lights (Are You Still Lost Out Here Tonight)

by Harmako



Series: What Could Have Been (Or What We Might Have Had) [3]
Category: Xenoblade Chronicles
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Drabble, F/M, Implied Body Modification, Implied Memory Loss, Light Angst, Relationship Study, Spoilers for Xenoblade Chronicles, Valak Mountain (Xenoblade Chronicles), i love them, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:41:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25988389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harmako/pseuds/Harmako
Summary: Lost under the twinkling lights of Valak Mountain, Shulk thinks of Fiora.
Relationships: Fiora/Shulk (Xenoblade Chronicles)
Series: What Could Have Been (Or What We Might Have Had) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1835419
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	Under the Dancing Northern Lights (Are You Still Lost Out Here Tonight)

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not too fond of posting works that are less than 1000 words, but I thought I could let this one slide (;
> 
> Written while listening to the song [Can You Hear Me](https://youtu.be/lvjTPIjszRM) by Henri Purnell.

As he looked up to the night sky, and to the shimmering, otherworldly lights of Valak Mountain, Shulk couldn’t help but think of _her_.

Her being Fiora, of course. 

She was constantly on Shulk’s mind, her face haunting his thoughts, her laughter and light just out of reach, ever since the fateful day he and his friends had arrived on Prison Island.

Shulk had thought Fiora was dead, gone forever… but then, there she had been, encased in steel and gold. Her face adorning a Mechon body, shocking Shulk to his very core.

As Shulk sat restlessly at the mouth of one of the mountain’s many caves, keeping watch for the rest of his companions, he could not help but think that Fiora would have liked to see these lights with him. She would have gasped in awe at the sight of Valak at night, a world so drastically different from Colony 9, blanketed in cold and snow, a silence that stretched miles.

In another world, another life, back when things had been good, back when they had been happy, Shulk would have sat there at ease. He would have gone on and on about the lights in the sky. He would have theorized about the ether that shone into space, analyzed the thousands of frigid crystals that produced the beams. He would have been teased by Reyn as he stood with a hand on his chin and a distant look in his eyes, oblivious to the look of fond exasperation on his friend’s face.

They would have been in the towering, icy mountains on an adventure, maybe. A journey of discovery, all of them, exploring the wonders of Bionis without a care in the world.

And most importantly, Fiora would have been there with them. 

She would have shaken her head at Reyn’s constant complaining, his moans and groans of cold feet and never-ending hunger. She would have laughed alongside Reyn as Shulk wandered off to investigate some strange phenomenon and inevitably tripped and fell into the snow. Shulk would have watched the way her green eyes sparkled as she laughed, and would have been safe in the knowledge that she was there by his side.

There would be no Monado, no visions of the future, and no Mechon. Just Fiora, Reyn, and Shulk. The three of them, like always.

But that was nothing but a dream. An impossible dream.

Instead, Fiora had been cruelly torn from the world, and from Shulk and Reyn. Robbed too soon of her life, they had eventually come to the painful conclusion that Fiora was dead, and that they would never hear her laughter, so carefree and joyful, ever again.

But now, Fiora was alive.

And Shulk did not know what to think. For this Fiora was not _his_ Fiora. This Fiora was cold, lifeless, clad in metal and wires. She lacked the sparkling green eyes and the youthful energy that Shulk had come to love.

This Fiora had turned away from Shulk, from Reyn, and from even Dunban, and flown off without a second glance.

Anyone would have deduced that this could not have been Shulk’s Fiora.

But the truth rested heavy on his shoulders like a sodden blanket, and he could not ignore it. That Mechon body with Fiora’s face, her eyes—the sound of her voice, however altered, the image that had haunted Shulk for days, weeks, maybe months, he didn’t know.

He could not understand why she hadn’t heard him as he screamed her name, why she hadn’t turned in that silver Mechon, abandoned it right there in favour of Shulk’s embrace.

But it had been Fiora, mechanized body or not. Shulk could not escape her green eyes, the way she’d met his desperate gaze, eyes alight with something he could not decipher, at the top of Prison Island.

It hurt to think of her, made his heart ache. It was hard to wonder whether or not she was really out there, if she even remembered Shulk, or any of them, at all. To have been so close, yet so far.

And so, as Shulk looked to the stars on the side of that cold, quiet mountain, thinking of the lights and of Fiora, he wondered if Fiora was thinking of him too.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments + kudos are appreciated <3


End file.
